A daily dose of my obsessive thoughts on film, music, TV, and everything in between

The 100 Greatest Movies I’ve Ever Seen

Long ago, I’ve been obsessed with making lists and memorizing them, whether it be knowing the capitals of every country in the world in first grade, or the name of every damn Best Picture Oscar winner in high school, I was nutty for lists. I don’t know why it is. I just love a good list. In my recent turn as a cinephile, I’ve come to appreciate a great many bloggers, film critics and historians, and artists, mostly by coming across their lists for greatest films ever. These lists have become my source for what films to go see in my annual movie list. Lists like the Sight and Sound Top 250 or the 1001 Movies You Need to See Before You Die or the AFI Top 100 American films are just the basic bread and butter of all beginner cinephiles, I think. But sprinkle in there lists by specific bloggers, like my personal favorites Nathaniel Rogers and Nick Davis, professional film critics I admire, like Guy Lodge or Mike d’Angelo and of course Roger Ebert, and then by random searches for Greatest (Insert region) films ever, and you get a wide range of films that will take years to find and tackle. So what’s a cinephile to do? Well start digging in.

This year, I’ve reached a personal milestone: I’ve watched 1,500 movies in my lifetime (according to my handy dandy letterboxd). A small fraction compared to my favorite people’s film count, but an accomplishment to myself nevertheless. And back when I was still reading through all of these Greatest-film lists and dreaming of just watching all these films, I’ve long made a promise to myself that I will make my own Greatest Movie List and put it out there.

Making a list of the greatest movies I’ve ever seen proved challenging. How on earth do I narrow down a list of some 190 films that I think are the absolutely best movies in history to just 100? What criteria do I set to compare one movie to another, especially when I think they’re both impressive? Most importantly, what do I want this film list to represent? I imagine many people who’ve done such an impossible task have come across the same questions I had. Nonetheless, I want this list to represent me and my thoughts and my personal taste. When I finished the list, I was surprised by just how much the films I chose reflect my preoccupations, my worldview, and ultimately my life. Such is the nature of the beast.

Anyway, I’m going to be emulating my favorite film blogger’s method of disseminating his best-of list: by writing just 100 words about what I love about the movie and why I think it deserves to be on this list. But unlike Nick Davis, I want to add on similar films that my finalist reminds me of and that are worth watching.